Russia’s Central Bank

MOSCOW, January 15. /TASS/. Russian presidential aide Andrey Belousov said on Thursday he expects that the Central Bank will lower the key interest rate in the coming months.

“In the coming months, we will see the interest rates go down,” Belousov told the Gaidar Economic Forum.

The Russian presidential aide also said that ruble will strengthen if no "cataclysms" occur. However, Belousov said he did not rule out "certain aggression" against the ruble in the near future amid lowered Russia’s ratings by international agencies. “We are to go through some period of challenge if not to say aggression against the ruble linked to changes in Russia’s ratings by the leading ratings agencies,” he said.

He said he expects that the Russian currency will get stronger if oil prices do not plunge. “My expectations are that the overall trend will be that the ruble will strengthen if no significant shocks on the oil market occur and the price does not plunge. We see no grounds for this (oil price fall),” Belousov told journalists on the sidelines of the Gaidar Economic Forum.